1. Field of the Invention
The present invention concerns a device to monitor a patient in an apparatus used for medical examinations. More particularly, it concerns a device to monitor a patient in an apparatus for imaging by nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) or similar type of apparatus.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In an apparatus for imaging by nuclear magnetic resonance, the patient lies down, during the examination, inside a tunnel formed by the different magnets creating the magnetic field, this tunnel being itself surrounded by a Faraday cage. The patient is therefore in a rather claustrophobic environment. To increase the patient's comfort, it is therefore preferable to ventilate and illuminate the examination tunnel and to be able to converse with the patient. Because of this, the patient is linked to the operator by a system of loudspeakers and microphones, as well as by a manually-operated distress signal system. In any case, the patient has to be constantly monitored so that any anomaly in his behaviour can be detected. To do this monitoring, there are television camera systems connected to a monitoring display screen implanted in the operator's control desk. This television camera cannot be positioned fixedly inside the examination tunnel because, the patient is not always placed in the same position during the examination: this position depends on the part of the body which has to be examined. To enable fool-proof detection of any anomalies in the patient's behaviour, the main zones that have to be observed are, particularly, the mouth and the eyes. Now, currently used monitoring devices do not enable these zones to be detected irrespectively of the patient's position inside the examination tunnel.
It is an object of the present invention to cope with these drawbacks by proposing a device to monitor the patient in a medical examination apparatus, enabling the patient to be monitored irrespectively of his position inside the examination tunnel.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a device to monitor the patient in a medical examining apparatus, where this monitoring device is set once and for all and accepts all possible configurations of examination.